


the first six months of forever

by lahtays



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Happy Ending AU, Hurt/Comfort, Make up sex, Post-Canon Fix-It, Smut, a sickening amount of fluff honestly, calling this a slow burn speed run lmao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:01:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21858727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lahtays/pseuds/lahtays
Summary: "The Inquisition is behind them. The war, the fighting, the desperate day to day they had come to accept as a permanent fixture in their lives - all of it, done. And as he follows her line of sight he no longer sees empty rooms, but blank canvases. Frescoes that have not yet been painted, stories yet to be written, and time - as fleeting as it is in this new world - time enough to create them."(a best possible outcome au. set five years post inquisition, after a hypothetical resolution to da4.)
Relationships: Female Lavellan/Solas
Comments: 6
Kudos: 85





	the first six months of forever

**MONTH I. PLUITANIS.**

Solas anticipates tragedy right from the start, theorizes a thousand different forms its catalyst might take, in the end. He expects the pain to be hard, to be _unbearable._

And still, he isn’t prepared for _this._

Ashara doesn’t get out of bed. She barely moves, scarcely eats. Sometimes, when he finds her form in the dull, pitch black of her quarters, he catches himself waiting, holding his breath until he can observe the weak rise and fall of her shallow breaths. _Still alive today._

Alive, but _destroyed._

In all his time within the Inquisition, he had never once seen her cry; even afterwards, at the Crossroads, in Tevinter, in the face of the destruction he had wrought. Countless agonies, too many sacrifices and hardships to count, and all of them endured with a fierce, dogged determinism that so often took his breath away. _“Grief is an admission of defeat,”_ she had said once, in the long, bleak days that followed Haven. _“I will not dishonour the people we have lost by catering to it. My tears serve no one, but my anger will.”_

Only, there is no one left to serve now, and nothing more to be defeated by, except herself. And so, she cries.

She cries, and cries, and cries, and doesn’t stop.

She cries for her murdered clan, for her sister, for her Inquisition. She cries for her lost arm and her _vallaslin_ , for her parents and Hawke and Iron Bull and Blackwall; cries for her and for him, for everything and for nothing.

She cries because she can. Because it’s the only thing left for her to do.

Sometimes Solas holds her, and sometimes he gives her space, but rarely does he leave her side these days. She doesn’t speak, and he doesn’t push – knows only too well that it’s not what she needs right now. He has to remind himself that this is a good thing, a necessary thing at the very least. Recites it in his head like a mantra during the worst nights, when her sobs grow so visceral and hoarse she nearly throws up from the force of it. All these years of pain and anguish held tightly inside, and it’s finally coming out, bursting through every hairline crack in the walls she has built around her heart.

How it kills him to see her like this.

Her hatred is long gone, and any remaining resentment is snuffed out by sorrow. She no longer recoils from his touch as she once had, but reaches for it, tentatively but with a conviction he doesn’t quite understand. Now, she accepts his comfort with all the hesitance of someone who _should_ know better, and with all the resignation of someone who no longer cares about technicalities like _should_ or _should not._

It isn’t forgiveness - he knows better than to ever expect it to be - but it is not damnation either. It’s a strange new thing between them, and he does not know what to make of it.

**MONTH II. NUBULIS.**

On the third dawn of the new month, the air grows still. Quiet, like the world is holding its breath.

Ashara gets out of bed.

It’s a slow, difficult task at first, like a Dwarf taking their first steps in the sun. She patrols the grounds of Skyhold, watching as its occupants once again begin to depart. She ties her hair up in its signature bun, takes her meals in the great hall on her own, and braves her days as best she can.

She talks to him again. So softly now, like she never has before.

The hesitance remains, but lesser, as if she has granted herself some unspoken permission, probationary and not without its terms, but acceptable enough to try. It’s guarded at first – two strangers making small talk to fill an uncomfortable silence. But somehow, despite everything, they _aren’t_ strangers, and it is a surprisingly simple thing to feel in sync with her once more. Slowly, awkwardness soon gives way to something casual and unassuming, with a faint likeness to a comfort they had shared once, briefly, in another life. There are no orders to be given, no secrets to maneuver around, no great hardships to overcome. The hardships have already been endured, and now it’s just them, and quiet talks in the mornings.

She grows stronger as the weeks go by. Colour comes back to her face. Her tears fall less, now only at night before she sleeps. She wanders the grounds again, and the routine of it sends his thoughts back five years prior; simpler times by far. She wandered then, too, always darting from one side of the keep to another, too quickly and with too much purpose for anyone to ever match her strides.

Five years later, and Skyhold is mostly silent now. With its armies retired and its dignitaries moved on to bigger and better things, the great hall feels ghostly, even at its busiest.

It is peaceful, if not a little sad. Like the blank white parchment that follows the last pages of a well-loved novel.

Ashara can feel it too, and it leaves her in a strange state of restlessness. She often spends her evenings in the now empty rotunda, staring at his old murals as if she were working out a puzzle, searching for something he can’t see - something he never even painted to begin with. His curiosity gets the better of him one night, and he can’t help but bring it up.

“I’m just … thinking,” comes her distracted answer, her gaze still darting from fresco to dusty fresco. “Deliberating.”

“I would be happy to hear your deliberations, if you were of a mind to share them with me.”

Her eyes break away from her observations and flicker to meet his, pausing only for a moment before she relents.

“What if there had been more to the story than these walls allowed, _lethallin?_ How would you have told the rest of it?” She asks.

“How else?” He replies, brow creasing slightly. “I would have begun again, somewhere unrestricted.”

“Hmm.”

She says nothing else, but her frown only deepens, and Solas can sense a conclusion forming in her mind. He knows her well enough to leave her to her musings, to give her thoughts room to grow.

**MONTH III. ELUVIESTA.**

It takes less than a week for the announcement to reach the rest of Thedas; the Inquisition, at long last, is disbanding.

Solas at first expects a bittersweet conclusion, a final grand farewell for the organization in which Ashara had once offered up everything she had. Instead, her reaction seems almost languid, as she already begins to withdraw herself from the heavy mantle of leadership. She has never been one to covet power for power’s sake alone; her ambitions, for good or ill, have always been focused on knowledge.

But the story is finished, and, finally, _finally_ , she allows herself to set the book down. To let go.

To begin again, unrestricted.

She has already set her sights on Val Royeaux – she had decided on that a long time ago, before Solas knew her, before she knew it were even possible herself. He remembers the morning after Halamshiral, his arm around her waist, watching the sun cast golden fire over the harbour. She had talked about it then, in surprising earnest; the little blue house by the sea, a dream she had plucked from the pages of a Shemlen book she had read once as a girl.

Through some stroke of luck, the Divine - still ever the watchful Spymaster at heart - had found it, or something impressively similar. Granted, this house is bigger than the one in her book, and borders a river rather than a sea, but it is the same sun washed, sky blue paint she had described in such vivid detail all those years ago, and he cannot remember the last time he has seen her smile so brightly.

And so Skyhold, so hazy and dreamlike only a few days prior, is jolted awake one last time by her fervour alone.

Arrangements are made; favours are called in. Half written letters and books on Val Royeaux are sprawled over every surface in the library, concepts for interior designs sketched on any blank surface she can find. She has a goal again, and she is invigorated. Lost in the process of it all.

Solas keeps to himself more often than not these days; lets her work, and busies himself the best he can. It is so good to see her content again, to see her smile and laugh and talk about the future. He _is_ happy for her, but it’s a happiness laced with melancholy.

It’s a selfish thing, to not want to be parted from her; to admit in his heart that the thought of her moving on – on from him – leaves him with a sick, sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach which hounds him even on the best of days. He knows it’s wrong, and unfair, and selfish, and –

“Perhaps you could begin painting again,” she interrupts his brooding one day, her words muffled between the pages of her thick leather-bound journal. “The city would surely appreciate your work.”

Solas glances at her, blinking as he grapples with the meaning of her words. “The city?”

She stares back at him, reading the confusion in his expression. “Yes, _the city_ ,” she says again, an exasperated smile ghosting the corners of her lips. “Val Royeaux?”

“I was unaware … Forgive me. I had not presumed I would be accompanying you.” He works to keep his voice steady, and Ashara’s smile wavers.

“Where else would you go?” She asks quietly.

He doesn’t have an answer. Neither does she. A long, heavy silence stretches between them, deafening.

“I would … like for you to come with me.” She says finally. “At least for a time, until we can come up with a more permanent arrangement. Until we can figure …” she pauses, and bites her tongue uncomfortably. “Until we can figure _this_ out.”

She doesn’t elaborate, and she doesn’t need to. Its implication follows him for the remainder of their time in Skyhold, echoing around in his mind, wrapping around his thoughts and seeping into his dreams like lyrium.

This. Them. _Us._

**MONTH IV. MOLIORIS.**

The moving process is surprisingly painless, in the end. Ashara has long since mastered the art of paperwork, and they both own little in the way of worldly possessions to start with.

It’s anticlimactic, in a way. Once the Skyhold staff departs, it’s just the two of them, still and silent in a house too big and too empty to truly feel like a home. He almost feels disappointment – he can scarcely remember the last time he has ever felt at home. _Surely this cannot be it?_

He looks at her, gauging her expression for some sort of confirmation. She is quiet, taking in light wooden floors and chipped white walls - thinking, considering, planning as always. And then, at last, she takes a breath – a deep, long, resounding breath – and with it, he understands.

The Inquisition is behind them. The war, the fighting, the desperate day to day they had come to accept as a permanent fixture in their lives - all of it, _done_. And as he follows her line of sight he no longer sees empty rooms, but _blank canvases_. Frescoes that have not yet been painted, stories yet to be written, and _time_ \- as fleeting as it is in this new world - _time_ enough to create them.

He looks at her, and finds her smile. Soft and small but so real, and it feels like home.

They spend surprisingly little time at the house. There is still so much to do, so many things to start. Their days are spent wandering city streets, combing through shops and stalls and hunting down whatever suitable furniture they can find. Absurdly, the now _former_ Inquisitor is not a rich woman; perhaps if she were human, her efforts would have bore greater compensation. But they are secure, and comfortable, and their nights together - when not spent agonizing over ridiculous furniture assembly – are peaceful in a way Solas barely recognises anymore.

Of course, their walls are still up, and every exchange is still performed with careful consideration, but the routine almost feels redundant now. They dine out more often than not; the month is a blur of cafes and restaurants and secret, untouched spots they had discovered together during the day. Outings last until the early hours of the morning, laden with soft talk and softer touches, fleeting and experimental, but reminiscent of what they had once shared together, years before.

It comes to a precipice innocently – so innocent it borders absurdity. The house at last has reached a state of liveability, and Ashara finally resigns herself to stay home for the night. Her kitchen ( _their_ kitchen?) is spacious enough, its counters covered with fruits and vegetables and spices and ingredients they both have no name for, but with the room empty save for the two of them, the space feels significantly more crowded.

Ashara breaks the tense silence, crossing her arms with a frown. “You will have to bear with me,” she mumbles, a little forced. “I really don’t know the first thing about cooking.”

Solas looks at her, blinks, and then clears his throat. “ _Oh._ Nor do I, admittedly.”

_“Excuse me?”_

“I … well, regrettably, I never found much use or need for the skill, save for the necessary basics.” He hears the ridiculousness in his words, and can’t help but smile, chagrined.

Ashara doesn’t share his mirth. “ _How_ do you not know how to cook, Solas?” she asks, shaking her head incredulously.

“Surely I could ask the same of you, _lethallan_.”

“ _I_ am twenty nine!” She exclaims. “ _You_ are an ancient Elven god!”

“Not quite, although that _is_ the common misconception.”

“Oh, _spare_ me.”

Solas shrugs, feigning indifference and ignoring the warmth beginning to creep across his cheeks. “I can hardly claim omnipotence, Ashara. I suppose I simply never found the time.”

“’ _Never found the –_ ‘" She cuts herself off with a disgusted sigh to put Seeker Pentaghast to shame. “No matter. It’s fine. It’s _fine_. It can’t be that difficult, right?”

It _can_. It only takes twenty minutes for someone to drop a bowl of flour.

Solas gasps and Ashara swears, and they’re both on the floor before the dust settles, frantically reaching for a cloth as the powder swirls and spirals in their air above them.

_“Fenedhis -“_

_“- By the Dread Wolf -”_

His head shoots up in surprise, and finds her blinking at him, the embarrassment clear on her face at the slip. A moment of strange, charged silence passes between them before Ashara finally breaks into an uncomfortable laugh. Solas chuckles too, low and nervous enough to attract her gaze once more. She bites her lip and casts her eyes down at the white, powdery mess between them.

 _“Ir abelas.”_ She murmurs as she works at the floor with a rag, her prosthetic arm still continuing to surprise him with its capabilities. “Old habits, you understand.”

“I do.”

She frowns, her grip on the cloth tightening as her efforts grow more aggressive. “This will only take a moment.”

“Please, allow me -“

He reaches for the cloth, but finds her right hand instead. Falters. Feels a static in her touch so pronounced he could almost swear it was magic. Ashara’s hands, already covered in residual powder, freeze in place, and for a moment her eyes are glued to the sight of his fingers idle against her skin. Slowly, agonizingly so, she looks up.

“Solas …”

It’s a warning – or maybe a plea. But she is so _much_ , _too_ much, and there’s a streak of flour on her cheek, and his hand is at her face before he can stop himself, thumb brushing the powder away and lingering at the ridge of her cheekbone. He meets her eye, waits for her to push away. He waits for her to tell him no.

She leans into his caress, her fingers snaking up his arm, leaving trails of white in their wake.

 _“Solas …”_ She says again, barely a whisper.

His fingers brush against her lips; watching, fixated, as they part at his touch. They are so much _softer_ than he remembers.

_“Ma asha … ma vhenan …”_

He hasn’t called her by those names in years, but he speaks the words aloud now like it’s the easiest thing he’s ever done in his long, regretful life. Her mouth catches his own in a kiss, _hard_ , harder than she has ever kissed him before, and suddenly he’s in Arlathan again; no longer beholden to time, or mortality, or death. Centuries or seconds pass unnoticed and it’s just _them_ ; her lips against his own, his hands tangled in her hair like a lifeline, the kitchen floor a forgotten mess beneath them.

Her nails rake against his back, and the cool metal of her prosthetic ghosts along the skin under his tunic, and the sensations sends reality snapping back into sudden focus once more.

Only _now_ , he realizes with a rush of panic, there is _not enough time_ , not even close, and he can’t begin to touch her enough. He grabs at her waist, feverish, pulling them both awkwardly to their feet before lifting her up around him and setting her roughly down against the counter, dinner plans thoroughly abandoned.

Their hands are _everywhere_ , trailing, grasping at one another as if the world will end if they so much as dare to stop. There is no grace to this, no softness; it’s an onslaught, overwhelming, but his mind is a scrambled chorus of _not enough not enough not enough and more more more –_

Somehow their clothes are on the floor, and then he’s inside her, and she’s moaning, and gasping, and sobbing, and her lips at his throat pepper in a half dozen _I Love You’s_ between each frenzied kiss. Somehow he’s saying it back, murmured like a prayer against her open mouth. Like a confession.

They don’t make it to the bedroom. They don’t even make it out of the kitchen.

**MONTH V. FERVENTIS.**

The sex is _relentless._

For the first week, they can hardly pull themselves out of bed. Everything beyond it fades into obscurity, unwanted and forgotten as they discover each other for the first time in the waking world. Again, and again, and again.

They had shared stolen moments of intimacy in the fade, long ago; it had been an ill-advised compromise on Solas’ part, but not one he could ever truly bring himself to regret. He had thought he’d understood her then, thought sharing her dreams could somehow equate to _knowing_ her, and had disregarded the physicality of their relationship as little more than an afterthought, for his own sake. After all, things have always been _easier_ for him in the fade.

He is proven a fool, once more.

This sex isn’t easy, nor flawless, but it is exhilarating in a way he can scarcely comprehend. In truth, he can barely recall the last time he has made love like this; uncompromisingly physical, grounded in the present, without the usual grace or elegance he has grown so accustom to in dreams. There is a divine _discomfort_ in sex not reliant on the fade, a discomfort that can only come from the wholly and utterly _real_. It’s messy and vulnerable and obscene, full of fumbling limbs and sweat and parts that don’t quite fit together in the effortless way he’d once considered ideal. He can feel the sting of every nail scratched into his back, every graze of teeth scraped rough against his jaw, the numbness of swollen lips after hours of manic kissing. In the moments after they finally bring each other to completion, he finds Ashara dishevelled and flushed and covered in sweat, both hers and his own, and he knows he surely mirrors her state exactly.

His body _aches_ , his self-control undone, and it’s indescribable. Heaven dulls by comparison.

Eventually, when their kitchen inventories run low, they are at last forced to exercise _some_ degree of restraint, though the difference – for anyone unfortunate enough to witness it - is negligible to say the least. They can barely keep their hands from one another now, and their bodies seem to gravitate around each other, acting and reacting in tandem, like conduits linking some unknowable force between them.

As the weeks pass them by in a blur, their coupling grows more daring and explorative. Solas learns what Ashara likes through euphoric trial and error, and vice versa, and in the spaces between their shared desires lies a mutual willingness to try new things, to challenge and to trust in one another again.

_(It’s overwhelming, to feel trusted by her once more.)_

He dislikes being rough with her, while she enjoys it – and so they settle for loose bindings, with the odd hair pulling every now and then. She resents being teased, and he loves it – and so a compromise is found in the discovery that _she_ loves to tease _him_. It continues like this, and as they learn to map the roads and forks and shortcuts of one another, Solas soon begins to feel as if she knows his body even better than he does. While he can have her coming apart seven, eight times a night now, she seems to have taken note of every twitch of his muscles, every gasp, every sigh, and soon she can keep him tethered on the brink of oblivion for hours before she finally thinks to grant him release.

 _This is far more perfect than it has any right to be,_ Solas thinks.

It’s a small, fleeting thought at first, conjured in the afterglow of an especially vigorous session shared between them one night. It should have _stayed_ small. He should not have followed the echo of it in the days that followed, should not have tracked it to its simple, terrible source.

_This cannot possibly last._

As suddenly as the realization hits, all semblance of peace abandons him.

There has been no _discussion_ , no real, tangible closure between them. They talk, and argue, and reconcile, but not about _that_. Not about the grim reality of the last five years, the blackened tumour growing steadily between them that neither has acknowledged since their arrival in Val Royeaux.

Dread creeps back, slowly but surely. He begins to watch the passing ships when they wander the city’s harbour, imagining himself among their decks, imagining where their sails might lead him. He begins to make plans, exit routes in the back of his mind in preparation for when Ashara inevitably comes to this same conclusion.

She says nothing, but he knows she can feel the shift in his temperament, too. She can feel it when he fucks her, when he moans her name against the hollow of her throat as he comes, when he kisses her like a drowning man gasping for air.

It isn’t right, to keep locking her out in the dark like this. He watches her fall asleep one night, blue eyes heavy lidded as the fade begins to claim her, and finally brings himself to face it head on.

“I could live another thousand years and never deserve you, _vhenan_.” He says softly, his lips pressed against the back of her hand entwined with his own.

“Ever the romantic,” she murmurs with a breathy, sleepy laugh. “I also, _ma'haurasha_.”

“You misunderstand.” Solas presses. “I mean I do not _deserve_ you, Ashara. And I have no way to ever make this right.”

Her eyes snap open, all traces of sleep gone in an instant. Carefully, and with a weary slowness, she sits upright, positioning the blanket to cover her nakedness before locking her sights on him.

“What are you talking about?” She asks flatly. She has the sharp, cold eyes of the Inquisitor again, with no trace of sympathy or remorse to be found. _How skilled she is at putting up her walls,_ Solas thinks sadly. _How skilled I am at forcing her to._

“You are far too bright to not know what I’m talking about.” He says, biting his tongue as Ashara yanks her hand from his, bringing it up to her chest to grip the blanket tighter around her chest.

“ _Don’t_ do this to me, Solas.” She warns.

“It is what I have _already_ done to you that should be your true concern.”

“How _dare_ you -”

Ashara’s words are cut off as she buries her face in her hand. She takes a deep breath, once, twice, three times, fighting as her composure begins to flicker. Solas heaves a ragged sigh, and sits up meet her level.

“I beg you to think this through, my love.” He says, his own voice insistent and rough. “All I’ve done to you, everything you have _suffered_ because of _my_ misdeeds, _my_ selfishness. Ashara, I have cost you a _limb_. Are you truly content to ignore all the pain I’ve inflicted and simply . . . what? Pretend it’s inconsequential?”

“I am not _pretending_ anything.” She hisses.

“Even so,” Solas continues, shaking his head and willing conviction in his words, “Even if you could – _somehow_ \- find acceptance in the long list of monstrous acts that I’ve committed – what then? Where could I possibly start? _How_ could I even begin to atone at all? Regardless of whether or not I am even _capable_ of such a feat – do I actually _deserve_ to be redeemed? Do I _deserve_ a choice in the matter? I want to make this right – truly I do – but therein lies another question; _why_ should I get what I want? _Fenedhis,_ the list goes on, but what I do know is this; I have considered this from every conceivable angle, Ashara, and I _cannot_ envision a world in which I could ever hope to make this right by you. By anybody.”

He’s rambling, he knows, and the end of his sentence echoes breathless and broken in the tense silence that follows. Ashara regards him darkly, her jaw clenched and her right hand balled into a fist at her chest. She says nothing for so long Solas begins to consider whether it would be best to just leave, when finally she sighs, and her exhaustion is all too obvious.

“Do you ever get tired of being so damn _clever_ about everything, Solas?” She asks quietly. Her voice is blunt, but not unkind.

Solas blinks. “I … I’m sorry?”

“All of these … these _all-encompassing questions,_ ” she scoffs, “and pointless philosophies with ridiculous open-ended answers that we _know_ will only ever lead to more uncertainty. Why do we keep doing it? We know that we never get anywhere by following them, and we’re never satisfied with their answers, and yet we still pursue them, and obsess over them, and find ways to … to _ruin_ the things that make us happy. Here we are, after all these years, still having these exact same conversations because it seems we just can’t help ourselves. Aren’t you just fucking _tired_ of it? Because I am.”

She ends so softly, and the ice in her eyes has melted into something warmer, something gentle and full of a sad love that makes him reel from the intensity of it. Solas swallows hard, his throat tight and dry and scratchy. “What kind of person would I be if I did _not_ ask such things?” He counters weakly.

“A sane one, perhaps?”

“This isn’t funny.”

“No, it really isn’t.“ She shakes her head, and casts her eyes down at her hand settled in her lap. After another beat, she speaks again, softer and clearer still. “I have far more compelling questions to ask of the world, _ma lath;_ questions with _real,_ tangible answers just waiting for me to find.” She bites her lip. “For … for _us_ to find. So just this once, Solas, and for just this _one_ thing - can we _stop_ being clever? Can we just accept that we don’t know, and let that be enough? I mean, maybe there _is_ no answer. Or, maybe the questions _are_ the answer, and all you can do is stay here, with me, and _try_. _Try_ to be good, to help people, to love me every day and know that we are equals, _together_.”

Her hand moves from her lap to the side of his face, holding him now with the softest of touches, her thumb tracing comforting circles against his cheek. He works to blink back tears, but she holds his gaze with the same quiet conviction he had fallen in love with five years prior.

“I don’t know if anything could ever be that simple.” He whispers, pressing his forehead to hers. “I hope it is.”

“Perhaps hope is enough.” She murmurs, her hand sliding down to squeeze at his shoulder. Gripping him in reality. “It isn’t a grand solution, I know, but it’s what I’m offering - if you want it, my love. A _home_. A place by my side. A companion, for as long as you’ll have me.”

Solas laughs, surprising himself with the authenticity of the sound, and pulls her forward into a gentle kiss. “For as long as _I’ll_ have _you_?” He repeats, feeling the corners of his mouth upturning despite himself.

“That’s what I said.” Ashara smiles back. She takes his hand in her own, and presses it firm against her chest. The pads of his fingers pick up the steady rhythm of her heartbeat, and with it what remains of his resolve is shattered. He splays his palm flat against her skin with a deep sigh, and buries his face in the crook of her neck.

“And what if, hypothetically, I said I wanted you forever?” He asks, lips ghosting along her collarbone.

“I would say that’s a fine start,” Ashara laughs. “ _If_ a little short term.”

 _Forever as a start, then,_ Solas thinks. He kisses her, slow and deep and with every ounce of love he has, and wills hope to be enough.

**MONTH VI. SOLIS.**

Slowly, like waking from a comfortable dream, they begin to catch up with the rest of the world.

Sex feels less dire now; a strange new type of passion. They had spent a month in bed, and in that time no nations had gone to war, no ancient adversaries had arisen, no cities had required their aid. They had spent a month in bed, waiting for the world to end, and somehow – impossibly - it hadn’t.

They no longer spend every waking moment tangled up in one another – now, their days are mainly spent independently, left to their own devices and searching for individual purpose. At first, adjusting to her sudden absence is a challenge – a surprising one, as neither she nor Solas have ever been the types for co-dependency. And yet the change is a blessing for both of them; slowly, they become themselves once more, with separate lives and goals and stories to share with one another over long, light hearted evenings.

Such evenings are his favourite. They agree – out of stubbornness more than anything - to stick with their attempts to learn how to cook, and despite their shared (and impressive) incompetence, he can’t deny that he finds this nightly process …

_Fun._

It’s a newfound, almost adolescent form of joy, to simply be _ridiculous_ with her. There’s a new lightness to Ashara in Orlais, a side he never saw of her when she had been Inquisitor. She frowns less, smiles far more, and even the phantom pains in her long lost arm do not trouble her as often as they once had. She thrives amongst all the possibilities the city has to offer, and the freedom - after all these years - to chose her own path seems to empower her far more than the Inquisition ever had.

She applies to the University of Orlais. A dream she has held since she was old enough to dream at all, and to see it so close to being realized is bittersweet. She keeps her nerves so expertly hidden under a mask of casual disinterest, disguises her excited pacing as errands and chores and an endless barrage of distractions, but her happiness is contagious, and impossible to ignore.

As they wait, Solas paints again. It’s a small victory in comparison, but falling back into the process of creating yields within him a deep, familiar comfort - a crutch for his doubts on the worst days, and the perfect outlet for inspiration on the best. Inspiration is not hard to come by, and his preferred subject is all too happy to assist. It takes very little time – Ashara’s doing, no doubt – for interested parties to come knocking at their door, nobles with gold trimmed masks all but tripping over themselves for commissioned pieces.

He refuses, for all except Briala. She requests public murals around former alienages and populous elven districts.

A small, inconsequential thing, but it _is_ a start. He owes the people – _his_ people – that much.

Days and weeks go by, chaotic in the best way for once. Solas soon barely has time to register just how happy he truly is, and how such happiness had seemed so impossible to him only six months prior. It’s in the moments with her, the moments in which he finally has a to catch his breath, that the reality of their new lives begins to dawn on him.

It hits him stronger than ever one night in particular, resting with her upon their oversized settee. They had been pouring over one of Varric’s new novels – an early gift for Ashara’s upcoming thirtieth name day – when his eyes had begun to drift to the candles she had set up by the fireplace some few weeks before. The candles she has lit every day since then, always a few minutes before dusk, without fail.

Twenty seven candles for the twenty seven Lavellans she had lost during the Inquisition. Three more for the ones she had lost long before. And at last, a final, solitary candle for herself.

The one Lavellan still left standing.

“Perhaps we ought to get married.”

The words leave his mouth before he even considers the magnitude of what he’s saying, but he makes no move to retract them, even as Ashara sets the book down, brow perched up in undisguised amusement.

 _“Hilarious.”_ She laughs, and rolls her eyes.

“I was speaking sincerely,” Solas smiles back, softly but with his intent clear. “I _could_ propose, if you had a mind for it. Alternatively, if you wished to uphold tradition, I know the Dalish have their own binding practices – perhaps that would be preferable. The choice is ultimately yours to make, of course.”

Ashara laughs again, darker this time, and only a moment later he finds her shifted up against his lap, her arm encircling around his neck and resting on the back of the loveseat - trapping him in her embrace.

“So _that’s_ what this is about,” she purrs, lips ghosting along the tip of his ear, teasing just enough to make his breath catch in his throat. “Would you like me to demonstrate _Dalish binding practices_ for you, _ma’haurasha?_ ”

“I believe you already have.” Solas smirks. “Thoroughly.”

“Oh?”

“ _Oh,_ indeed. But, by all means, if your offer still stands …”

It does, and the discussion promptly ends; the furthest thing from either of their minds.

It is only much, _much_ later, as they finally lay panting and gasping for breath in their bed, that the significance of his words seems to truly register with her.

“Don’t _ever_ propose, Solas.” Ashara mumbles, sleepy and breathless as she wraps her arm around him and pulls herself into the warmth of his chest. “Please.”

His grip around her tightens in turn, and he moves to kiss the top of her head. “You are truly so opposed to the idea?” he asks.

“You aren’t?”

“Matrimony is an oath, a promise made to someone you have resolved to spend your life with.” Solas replies. “I would be remiss if I didn’t appreciate the beauty in such a ritual, regardless of whether or not it is a necessary one.”

“Actions matter far more to me than empty words.” She says with a shrug. “Such things seem so … redundant, in the end.”

“I agree. But as I said; it is not always about necessity.”

She says nothing for a long time, deliberating on his words with a scholarly frown. In the dim light of their quarters, the air is silent but for their soft, synchronised breathing, and the distant cresting of waves from the harbour nearby.

Just as Solas begins to suspect she may have fallen asleep, Ashara sits up, and the flickering glow of the candlelight reveals something intense and sharp in the sapphire of her eyes.

“Give me your promises now, then.” She says quietly.

Solas looks at her, confused, as she takes his hand in her own.

“I can think of no place more sacred to me than in the sanctuary of our own home,” she continues, voice gentle but full of certainty. “If you want a ritual, perform it _here_. Right now. Tell me what you would say, as if we were stood before a union ceremony for all the world to see.”

Heart in his throat, he studies her expression, watching for some sign of jest or apathy or reluctance. What he finds instead is a soft smile, hinting at the same excitement he can feel building up in his own chest, growing stronger with each passing second. He can see her pulse quicken at the base of her throat. He can see her eyes, so open and so genuine with her love; watching and waiting for him to the make the next move.

And so he does. Slowly, he moves down from the bed, guiding her along with him until she sits against the edge of the mattress. He gets down on his knees before her; clasps her hand in both of his.

“If you should wish for such an oath,” he whispers, “made here and just for us, then who am I to ever dare refuse you? I vow to _always_ put you first, and share all that I have with you. To trust you and respect you as my equal. I will love you, and support you, in this moment and in all to come.”

Ashara bites her lip, the dim light catching a subtle wetness in the corners of her eyes, and leans down to press a kiss against his forehead.

“Then should I also make a vow?” she asks. “I will commit, with all I am, to walk with you and share in your ambitions.”

Solas shakes his head, overcome with a lightness he has never felt before, and guides her hand to rest against his cheek.

“You need not prove yourself to me, my love. You have already done far more than I could ever have imagined. I ask nothing but the chance to share the space in which your spirit rests.”

Ashara shifts down from the bed, joining him to kneel against the wooden floorboards of their home. She doesn’t speak – she doesn’t need to – but when her lips meet his, soft and sweet and strong and holier than any god he’s ever known, he is filled with a clarity so profound it takes his breath away.

This is _real_. _He_ is real. Whole, and alive, and awake, and enduring. A candle, not snuffed out but burning bright for all the countless people who couldn’t. As they kiss, wrapped up in the dark, he is swept along by a current of simple truths, each one more beautiful and overwhelming than the last. _Here. Home. Her. Happy._

_Not alone anymore._

And just like that, he feels the whole world change.

**Author's Note:**

> if you're seeing this, thank u SO much for reading until the end, you're a star !!!!
> 
> i don't usually write content this long, but if bioware won't give us a happy ending then i'll do it my damn self lmao
> 
> anyway please don't hesitate to leave kudos/comments/etc if you want and let me know what u thought! i'm very new to this site so idk what i'm doing lol, but feedback is always appreciated !! (also also let me know if you noticed the hallelujah cadence!)


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